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rOr-l    t(LZr\^  t|LZr\t 


The  A\an  With  a  Hoe 


An  Essay  in  Interpretation 


Wn.  Dallaa  Araxes. 


A  picture  is  the  painter's  incarnation  of  his  thoughts 
n  symbols  of  form  and  colour. 

George  Henry  I^ewes. 


REPRINTED 

O  VKRIy  AND 
June, 


FROM  THE 
MONTHIy  Y, 
1891. 


( • •   •  • 


"  As  Every  Grain  of  Gold  is  Gold, 
So  Every  Grain  of  Truth  is  Truth." 

Whatever  in  this  little  work  is  worthy  of  so  high  an 
dnor,  i  dedicate,  in  reverence  and  admiration,  to  him  who 
vs  devoted  his  life  and  fortune  to  the  service  of  humanity, 

TO  JOHN  RUSKiN. 


1  Some  tell  me  that  I  deny  the  charms 
of  the  country.  I  find  much  more  than 
f'jcharms, — I  find  infinite  glories.  I  see 
C'las  well  as  they  do  the  little  flowers  of 
S Which  Christ  said  that  Solomon,  in  all 
f^'his  glory,  was  not  arrayed  like  one  of 
l^these.  I  see  the  halos  of  dandelions, 
^}]ind  the  sun,  also,  which  spreads  out  be- 
^^yond  the  world  its  glory  in  the  clouds. 
^But  I  see  as  well,  in  the  plain,  the 
"^(Steaming  horses  at  work,  and  in  a  rocky 
Sjplace  a  man  all  worn  out,  whose  "Aan/'' 


las  been  heard  since  morning,  and  who 


■Mtries  to  straighten  himself  a  moment 
fand  breathe.    The  drama  is  surrounded 


151 


by  beauty. 


Jean-Francois  Millet. 


We  smile  at  the  epigram  that  Mezzo- 
fanti,  the  distinguished  Italian  linguist, 
could  speak  a  hundred  and  twenty  lan- 
guages, but  could  say  nothing  in  any  of 
them,  because  we  realize  that  language 
is  merely  a  means  to  an  end ;  that  facil* 
ity  in  picking  up  vocabulary  and  forms 
is  a  decidedly  second-rate  accomplish- 
nrient ;  and  that  the  ability  to  utter  com- 
rr,ionplaces  and  platitudes  in  several  lan- 
guages is  one  that  the  polyglot  shares 
with  sailors,  donkey-boys,  and  parrots, 
riut  comparatively  few  realize  that  every 
art,  using  the  term  in  the  narrow  sense, 
is  but  a  means  of  expression ;  that  the 
painter  that  has  mastered  technique  has 
also  but  learned  a  method  of  giving  con- 
crete representation  to  his  beliefs,  ideals, 
and  aspirations ;  that  without  something 
more  than  the  mere  manual  dexterity 
to  copy  accurately  what  is  placed  before 
^lim,  he  produces  work  no  more  admira- 


ble  than  that  of  any  other  handicraft 
requiring  a  quick,  correct  eye,  and  a 
trained,  obedient  hand.    ''Any  one  that 
can  learn  to  write  can  learn  to  draw," 
,  says  one  of  the  best  of  the  manuals ; 
I  and  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten  the  per- 
formance will  be  exactly  on  a  par  with 
that  of  the  professional  writing  master, 
1  it  might  have  added.    The  "  something 
j  more  "  may  be,  generally  is,  merely  a 
(poetical   sensitiveness  to  the  beauty 
i  everywhere  around  us,  but  overlooked 
jby  us  grosser  mortals  ;  the  painter  may 
(simply  glorify  the  commonplace  by 
(showing  us  the  really  important  in  the 
(apparently  trivial,  the  essentially  beau- 
tiful in  the  superficially  ugly. 

Art  was  given  for  that  — 
(  God  uses  us  to  help  each  other  so, 

I  Lending  our  minds  out; 

land  the  artist  that  thus  deepens  our  joy 
tin  life  and  its  surroundings  is  certainly 
^'doing  a  worthy  work  that  entitles  him 
jto  the  gratitude  of  every  one  whose 
/pleasure  he  has  increased,  or  whose 
i  burden  he  has  lightened.    But  when  he 
'draws  higher  things  with  the  same 
!  truth  ' ;  when  he  '  takes  the  Prior's  pul- 
pit-place, interprets  God  to  all  of  us ' ; 


1 


When  to_^eifecl^_ mastery  of  technique, 
passionate  admiration  of  beauty,  and 
delicate  selective  instinct,  he  adds  an 
earnest,  reverent  spirit,  warm  human 
sympathy,  and  a  noble  philosophy  of 
life,  he  produces  works  of  a  far  higher 
jvalue, —  works  that  the  world  will  not 
jwillingly  let  die. 

Back  of  all  art,  whatever  may  be  the 
means  of  expression  that  the  possession 
of  special  aptitudes  leads  him  to  employ, 
stands  the  artist  himself,  and  the  great- 
ness of  his  work  will  always  be  strictly 
commensurate  with  the  greatness  of  his 
soul.  Unconsciously  to  himself,  per- 
haps, his  personal  idiosyncrasies  and 
predilections  tinge  all  that  he  does,  and 
to  expect  noble  art  from  an  ignoble  man 
is  to  expect  figs  from  thistles.  For  better 
or  for  worse,  le  style  est  de  rhomme 
meme.  No  man  escapes  from  himself : 
the  Madonnas  of  the  sensualist  are  but 
draped  Venuses  ;  Titian's  Penitent  Mag- 
dalene has  yet  to  learn  the  meaning  of 
the  word  repentance ;  Rubens's  Greek 
goddesses  are  coarse  and  vulgar ;  Ber- 
nini's angels  are  of  the  flesh  fleshly.  On 
the  other  hand,  the  pure,  sweet  soul  of 
Fra  Angelico  speaks  from  every  stroke 


\of  his  brush ;  Donatello's  dancing  and 
singing  children  mirror  the  frankness 
and  simplicity  of  the  sculptor's  mind  ; 
^^md 

The  hand  that  rounded  Peter's  dome, 
And  groined  the  aisles  of  Christian  Rome, 

t      Wrought  in  a  sad  sincerity  ; 

j      Himself  from  God  he  could  not  free. 

tin  literature,  as  in  life,  we  rank  earnest- 
ness, morality,  and  modesty,  far  above 
Mippancy,  sensuality,  and  arrogance. 
Ford  is  ranked  below  Shakspere  because 
of  the  lower  moral  tone  of  his  plays  ; 
Johnson  above  Steele  because  of  his 
deeper  earnestness.  What  is  the  pecul- 
iarity distinguishing  paint  from  print- 
er's ink,  the  vibrations  of  stretched  cat- 
gut from  the  vibrations  of  the  vocal 
chords,  the  enduring  embodiment  of  a 
thought  from  its  fleeting  symbol,  that 
prevents  our  judging  the  manifestations 
of  man's  spirit  in  painting,  music,  sculpt- 
ure, and  architecture,  according  to  the 
same  criterion  ?  Was  "  art  for  art's 
sake"  ever  applied  to  anything  but  a 
clever  triviality  ? 

Two  things,  then,  are  to  be  considered 
in  every  picture :  the  mottf,  the  basal 
idea  ;  and  the  technique^  the  expression 


I 
1 


J' 


oflthe  idea.  Speaking  broadly,  it  may  be 
sajid  that  the  works  of  the  earliest  mas- 
ters —  Cimabue,  Giotto,  and  their  imme- 
diate followers  —  were  filled  with  noble 
se^ntiment  and  faulty  drawing;  that 
modern  art  is  wellnigh  perfect  in  tech- 
nique, but  trivial  and  barren.  The  old 
rejligious  feeling  that  inspired  so  many 
ofi  the  greatest  masterpieces  is  no  longer 
aril  active,  living  faith, —  at  least,  not 
aipong  modern  French  artists, — -and 
tlilere  is  little  in  contemporaneous  life  to 
take  its  place.  In  this  restless,  self- 
conscious  age  the  simplicity,  serenity, 
arid  sincerity,  of  Greek  sculpture  and 
early  Italian  painting  are  almost  lost 
qualities. 

Feeling  this  lack,  and  disgusted  with 
the  superficiality,  faulty  faultlessness, 
and  personal  self-display,  of  modern  art, 
a  few  painters,  deliberately  forgetting 
their  superior  technique,  give  us  the  in- 
correct drawing,  lack  of  perspective,  and 
ungraceful  stained-glass  "  attitudes,  of 
the  early  masters,  hoping  that  amid  the 
dross  the  pure  gold  may  lie  hid.  With 
the  Charity  of  Puvis  de  Chavannes,  the 
Ecce  Ancilla  Domini,  the  Girlhood  of 
Mary  Virgin  in  mind,  who  will  say  that 


i 

i 


they  do  not  sometimes  succeed?  But 
surely  the  painter  that,  forgetting 
naught,  suppressing  naught,  attains  the 
same  sincerity;  that  unites  the  simpli- 
city and  self-effacement  of  Bellini  or 
Carpaccio  with  the  perfect  execution  of 
modern  French  art,  is  of  a  higher  type. 
And  such  a  man  was  Jean-Frangois 
Millet. 

The  Man  with  a  Hoe  was  generally 
conceded  to  be  far  and  away  the  most 
important  canvas  in  the  late  exhibition  ; 
but  its  superiority  over  the  facile  pret- 
tiness  of  Bouguereau,  the  clever  "effect- 
iveness" of  Gerome,  and  the  smooth 
inanity  of  Cabanel,  is  not,  I  take  it,  a 
superiority  of  technique.  Considered 
merely  as  a  painted  representation  of 
things  seen,  it  is,  to  be  sure,  a  great 
work  of  art ;  considered  in  its  deeper 
meaning,  it  is  a  work  of  great  art. 

Well,  they  call  that  a  great  paint- 
ing !  Why,  there  is  n't  a  bit  of  expres- 
sion in  the  face,  and  I  can 't  see  the  eye 
at  all.  The  man  looks  like  an  idiot ! " 
was  a  remark  heard  before  the  picture. 

"  Yes,"  was  the  answer  ;  "  he 's  a 
mere  animal.  I  suppose  it 's  true  to  na- 
ture ;  but  why  could  n't  the  artist  have 
chosen  a  prettier  model  ?" 


Possibly  the  reason  was  that  he  had 
no  intention  of  producing  a  pretty  pic- 
ture. Can  it  be  believed  that  a  painter 
of  such  insight  and  accuracy  as  Millet 
elsewhere  in  this  picture  shows  himself 
to  be,  overlooked  what  is  thus  apparent 
to  the  most  superficial  observer;  that 
he  did  not  know  that  his  peasant  is  ugly 
and  awkward,  having  more  in  common 
with  the  beasts  of  the  field  than  with 
Voltaire  and  Victor  Hugo,  Laplace  and 
Pasteur,  Pascal  and  St.  Louis ;  that  he 
could  not  see  that  the  picture  not  only 
is  not  pleasing,  but  is  positively  repul- 
sive Surely,  we  may  assume  that  Mil- 
let knew  all  this,  and  pass  to  the  further 
question :  How  came  an  artist  to  paint 
such  a  picture,  deliberately  to  prefer  ug- 
liness to  beauty,  awkwardness  to  grace  ? 
The  answer  that  Millet  was  a  realist, 
and  painted  what  he  actually  saw,  is 
hardly  an  adequate  one.  Realism  is  not 
necessarily  ugliness  or  triviality;  it  is 
merely  truth  to  nature ;  and  "  there  are 
other  truths  besides  coats  and  waist- 
coats, pots  and  pans,  drawing-rooms  and 
suburban  villas."  W/iat  he  sees  depends 
on  the  artist  himself.  This  world  is  full 
of  beauty,  and  the  painter  that  deliber- 


1 


ately  prefers  to  portray  the  ugly  must 
justify  his  choice,  be  he  realist,  idealist, 
conventionalist,  impressionist,  or  what 
not.  If  there  is  sufficient  reason  for  the 
preference  ;  if  the  painter  has  some  im- 
portant lesson  to  teach,  some  great  truth 
to  bring  home  to  men's  business  and 
bosoms,  and  if  only  the  ugly  will  ex- 
press his  meaning  or  answer  his  pur- 
pose, he  may  be  justified ;  otherwise  not. 
The  Gothic  gargoyle  has  a  sufficient 
raison  d'etre ;  that  sensual,  leering  face 
on  the  Venetian  Santa  Maria  Formosa 
only  reflects  the  bestiality  of  its  maker's 
mind.  To  show  that  Millet's  choice  can 
be  justified  ;  that  the  ugliness  is  essen- 
tial, not  accidental ;  that  the  uncouth 
alone  would  answer  his  purpose,  is  the 
object  of  the  present  essay. 

Born  and  reared  among  peasants,  Mil- 
let knew  by  sad  experience  the  hard- 
ships of  their  laborious,  joyless  lives. 
Others,  drawing  their  inspiration  from 
Vergil  and  Theocritus,  might  paint  the 
shepherd  piping  to  his  flock,  the  refined 
young  laborer  wooing  the  lady-like  dairy 
maid,  the  village  festivity  under  the 
trees,  the  dance  on  the  green  ;  he  knew 
only  the  weary  shepherd  caring  for  his 


flock  in  the  bleak,  cutting  wind ;  the 
uncouth  Potato-diggers  ;  the  unchildish 
Goose-tender ;  the  hardly  human  Man 
with  a  Hoe.  He  painted  the  life  as  he 
knew  it  in  all  its  hideousness  and  repul- 
siveness,  the  strongest  of  his  pictures 
being  the  one  under  consideration.  Let 
us  see  what  it  represents. 

Leaning  on  his  short -handled  hoe,  a 
common  laborer  is  resting  for  a  moment 
to  ease  his  back  from  the  pain  caused  by 
continual  stooping  at  his  task  of  prepar- 
ing a  bit  of  waste  land  for  cultivation  : 
one  of  the  lowest  class  in  society,  of  the 
substratum  on  which  the  whole  fabric 
rests,  is  represented  engaged  in  the  low- 
est work  of  agriculture.  Next  year,  in 
consequence  of  this  man's  labor,  two 
blades  of  grass  will  grow  where  one  now 
grows ;  and  every  man  in  the  realm,  up 
to  Napoleon  the  Little  himself,  on  his 
stolen  gilt  gingerbread  throne,  will  re- 
ceive benefit,  inappreciable  perhaps,  but 
none  the  less  real,  from  this  man's  toil. 
Along  the  whole  line,  from  lowest  to 
highest,  through  all  grades  of  society, 
will  be  felt  the  good  effects  of  his  hav- 
ing subdued  to  man's  service  yet  a  bit 
more  of  Mother  Earth.  The  benefactor 


of  humanity  —  he  is  no  less  !  And  how 
does  society  reward  its  benefactor  ? 
Why,  when,  in  a  few  moments,  the  dull 
backache  is  somewhat  m.ore  bearable, 
he  '11  go  at  his  wearisome  toil  again ; 
and  when  it  gets  too  dark  to  work,  he  '11 
go  home  to  his  squalid  hut,  eat  his 
meager  supper  of  coarse  food,  and  in 
utter  physical  exhaustion,  fling  himself 
on  his  straw  —  for  what?  To  seek  in 
sleep  sufficient  strength  to  pass  the  mor- 
row in  the  same  manner.  And  next 
week  he  '11  bring  under  cultivation  yet  a 
little  more  waste  land ;  and  next  year  a 
little  more ;  and  next  decade  a  little 
more ;  till  at  last  he  gives  up  the  unequal 
contest,  and  is  shoveled  under  the  earth 
that  he  has  struggled  so  long  to  subdue. 
His  face  expresses  no  emotion, —  what 
emotion  should  it  express  ?  Joy,  think 
you?  Or  hope?  His  father  and  his 
father's  father  labored  thus  before  him, 
and  for  aught  that  he  can  see,  his  chil- 
dren's children  will  but  continue  his 
work.  Expression  denotes  intelligence, 
and  what  time  has  he  for  the  cultivation 
of  the  God-given  intellect  that  alone  dis- 
tinguishes him  from  the  brutes  that  he 
compels  to  his  service  ?  He  hardly  real- 


izes  that  he  has  such  a  thing.  Is  it  any 
wonder  that  a  church  that  promises 
simply  everlasting  rest,  of  which  the 
momentary  cessation  of  work  during  the 
ringing  of  the  Angehis  is  the  type, 
has  so  deep  a  hold  on  this  people  ? 

This,  then,  is  the  reward  that  society 
bestows  upon  her  benefactor  in  this 
boastful  nineteenth  century,  in  the  most 
highly  civilized  nation  in  the  world, — 
barely  the  means  of  subsistence,  that  he 
may  keep  alive  to  cgntinue  to  benefit 
her !  In  France,  mother  of  arts  and 
sciences  ;  in  gay,  light-hearted,  vivacious 
France,  with  its  "civilizing  mission," 
thousands  of  men  and  women,  formed 
in  the  image  of  their  Maker,  and  equal 
in  His  sight  with  the  courtliest  gentle- 
men and  most  gracious  ladies  of  the 
land,  thus  wear  out  their  lives  in  ex- 
hausting, soul-stupefying  labor,  that  one 
may  pass  his  time  in  luxurious  idleness, 
devising  schemes  for  spending  his  in- 
come or  for  warding  off  ennui !  And  in 
a  social  system  based  on  the  rule  of  the 
old  border  foragers, 

That  they  should  take  who  have  the  power, 
And  they  should  keep  who  can. 


the  mass  of  mankind  tamely  acquiesces  ; 
as  if  "the  wasteful  straitness  and  blank 
absence  of  outlook  or  hope  of  the  mil- 
lions, who  come  on  to  the  earth  that 
greets  them  with  no  smile,  and  then 
stagger  blindly  under  dull  burdens  for 
a  season,  and  at  last  are  shoveled  silently 
back  under  the  ground,"  were  necessary 
concomitants  of  any  possible  social  or- 
der ;  as  if  "the  perfection  of  social  bless- 
edness" had  once  for  all  been  achieved! 
After  all,  is  not  Carlyle  right ;  was  not 
Gurth,  born  thrall  to  Cedric  the  Saxon 
and  certain  of  his  share  of  the  bacon, 
better  off  than  the  modern  worker,  born 
thrall  to  a  social  system  that  to  the  un- 
ceasing labor  of  the  slave  adds  the  har- 
rassing  uncertainty  of  gaining  even  the 
means  of  subsistence  ?  Is  the  "freedom" 
of  the  laborer  of  the  present  day  more 
than  a  nominal  one  ?  Has  he  not  been 
"robbed  of  the  substance  and  fooled 
with  the  shadow  "  ? 

In  Millet  the  lower  classes  found  a' 
voice  to  protest  against  the  monstrous 
inequalities  of  the  present  social  order. 
To  a  people  filled  with  ideas  of  country 
life  drawn  from  eclogues,  idyls,  and  pas- 
torals, he  revealed  the  bitter  truth.  Of 


the  wealthy,  pleasure-loving  Parisians, 
this  picture  asked,  "Can  you  devise  no 
means  by  which  the  poor,  whose  toil 
enables  you  to  live  in  ease  and  luxury, 
may  enjoy  at  least  the  comforts  of  life  ? " 
Their  only  answer  was  to  refuse  The 
Man  with  a  Hoe  admission  to  the  salon 
because  of  its  socialistic  tendencies, — 
and  six  years  later  Paris  was  in  the 
hands  of  the  Commune.  No  CEdipus 
having  yet  arisen  to  solve  the  riddle,  to 
every  thinking  man  this  voice  from  the 
peasantry  still  cries.  In  vain  do  we 
shrug  our  shoulders  and  murmur,  "  So 
hath  it  been ;  so  be  it.  Though  the 
times  may  be  out  of  joint,  we  were  not 
born  to  set  them  right in  our  heart 
of  hearts  we  cannot  forget  the  fate 
of  him  who  asked,  "Am  I  my  broth- 
er's keeper  "  De  te  fabula  !  cries  con- 
science. 

To  say  that  the  picture  preaches  so- 
cialism is,  however,  merely  to  acknowl- 
edge that  in  the  depths  of  your  own 
soul,  though  perhaps  only  thus  uncon- 
sciously are  you  willing  to  confess  it, 
there  is  a  lurking  belief  that  in  some 
form  of  socialism  is  to  be  found  the 
future  welfare  of  the  human  race.  Mil- 


let  proposGB  no  scheme,  spreads  no 
propaganda.  He  is  destructive,  not 
constructive.  He  merely  points  out  the 
evil,  and  leaves  it  for  others  to  find  the 
remedy.  Small  wonder,  however,  that 
by  those  of  the  lower  classes  that  still 
retain  some  gleams  of  intelligence,  spite 
of  their  grinding,  stupefying  toil,  the 
red  flag  is  unfurled ;  and  that  schemes 
of  communism,  socialism,  nay,  even  of 
anarchy,  must  be  put  down  at  the  point 
of  the  bayonet  and  the  mouth  of  the 
cannon.  But  one  might  as  well  try  to 
stay  the  incoming  tide  with  mop  and 
bucket.  Some  change  must  come,  and 
as  one  of  the  wisest  of  English  states- 
men has  written,  "It  is  only  the  faith 
that  we  are  moving  slowly  away  from 
the  existing  order,  as  our  ancestors 
moved  slowly  away  from  the  old  want  of 
order,  that  makes  the  present  endurable, 
and  any  tenacious  effort  to  raise  the 
future  possible." 

By  whatever  means  it  may  be  accom- 
plished, whether  by  a  modification  of  the 
present  social  system,  or  by  "grasping 
the  sorry  scheme  of  things  entire,  and 
shattering  it  to  bits,"  Heaven  hasten  the 
day  when  no  peasant-painter  anywhere 


on  this  fai» earth  will  have  cause  to  utter 
such  a  protest  against  man's  inhuman- 
ity to  man ;  when  the  interest  in  The 
Man  with  a  Hoe  will  be  merely  techni- 
cal and  antiquarian. 


^oxmm 


Cez   


vvlOSANCElf, 


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